Google announced back in 2010 it was seeking communities to participate in an experiment involving insanely fast fiber-optic broadband. The plan was called Google Fiber and ultimately Kansas City was chosen. The first homes and businesses with Google Fiber had their 1 Gbps service turned on yesterday.

However, anytime we see internet providers offer theoretical peak speeds, we usually take them with a huge grain of salt. However, it looks like Google Fiber is actually incredibly fast in the real world.

A Google Fiber user named Mike Demarais ran a speed test only minutes after his service went live according to ArsTechnica. He achieved 696.38 Mbps download and an impressive 620.49 Mbps upload.

"The first thing I did was BitTorrent Ubuntu," Demarais said. "I think that took two minutes, let me try it again right now."

The home where Demarais accesses these incredibly fast internet speeds is operated by Homes for Hackers, and is owned by Ben Barreth. Entrepreneurs can live in the house rent and utility free for three months at a time, only needing to pay for their own groceries.

Homes for Hackers is billed as an attempt to kick start high-tech businesses within the city.

Google offers a few different plans for customers. For $120/month you get Gigabit internet (up/down), HDTV service, a Nexus 7 tablet, and 1 TV box. If all you need is gigabit internet, that will only run you $70/month. Google is even offering a "free" internet service (guaranteed for at least 7 years) that provides 5Mb down/1Mb up. However, customers have to pay the $300 "construction fee" that is waived on the two paid packages.

There are no data caps on any of Google's packages (including the "free" one).

For real. TWC and others better take this as a wake up call. The worst is when your 1yr bundle package expires and your bill goes from $89+taxes to $155+taxes. If you drop the phone and haggle you are lucky to get it down to $120/month...

TWC's quality of service high?? You must be high on something. TWC is not rated high on anything not their customer service and not their cable or Internet service. We had been with the "same" cable provider for 22 years which is currently TWC and before that was @home, Adelphia, and not sure what it was before that. They have always had poor customer service, old technology, and not the greatest TV quality. 7 months ago we cancelled and switched everything to AT&T Uverse and everything about the service is superior to what TWC provided us for quite a bit less a month. Sure I would rather have google fiber first and Verizon fios 2nd but any of these services are better than TWC in every way.

quote: Text They have always had poor customer service, old technology, and not the greatest TV quality. 7 months ago we cancelled and switched everything to AT&T Uverse and everything about the service is superior to what TWC provided us for quite a bit less a month.

Indeed I have also tried TWC compared with AT&T and many others. AT&T's "Box" or port for my area is like 50 feet away from my apartment so DL is usually around 2-10MBps. Compared with TWC's 1-5. This is at a 18MBps cap with 4 computers in the place. TWC is low quality unless you happen to catch a good "spot".

I know what you're saying, bud. Here in Denver, I have either Comcast @$60/month for 20Mb/768k or Century Link at 5Mb/1Mb @$40/month, and neither are very reliable or manage traffic very well. I have Comcast, and on evenings, I get maybe 4Mb with periods of 250ms latency and spikes up to 3000ms latency. It makes gaming and downloads annoying at times. Watching Hulu or Netflix means periodically pausing it to let the buffer fill up so I can keep watching. If Google came to town, I'd snatch that up no matter the cost. Neither Comcast nor Century Link are worth spending money on, but I don't have any other choices.